production assistance was provided by allbritton communications and "politico." captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- >> thank you, mr. president, for

upholding the jewish people's rights to a jewish state. >> president obama in israel -- the chill is gone. >> i see this visit as an opportunity to reaffirm the unbreakable bond between our nations. >> rand paul, the man with a plan. >> i call the plan trust but verify. >> republicans look at what went wrong in 2012. >> when republicans lost in november, it was a wake-up call. >> the war in iraq 10 years later, the budget that refuses to die. >> our budget plan reduces the deficit without raising taxes. >> the republican plan is the same baby with a new diaper.

>> we know tt until recentl president obama and israeli prime minister netanyahu enjoyed what can be politely described as a somewhat strained relationship. on april 7 of last year, the "new york times" reported benjamin netanyahu and mitt romney enjoyed a warm relationship. almost one year later, the israelis have given obama a medal. they appear to be on the same page on iran. >> diplomacy and sanctions have not stopped iran's nuclear programs. diplomacy and sanctions must be augmented by a clear and credible threat of military action. >> we will do what is necessary to prevent iran from getting the world's worst weapons.

>> will this story have a happy ending? >> this story will not have a happy ending. what we saw this week was barack obama at his best, connecting with an audience, and he made a compelling case for the need for a two-state solution, the security of israel and the well- being of the region. >> charles? >> the emphasis has been on personality. what happened is obama changed his positions on the settlement and the peace process. he realized he made a terrible mistake in the first term. he insisted on a settlement freeze as a preconditio. it wrecked peace negotiations and stopped everything. he changed, went back and said in a startling statement that if

you get a peace agreement, the sttlement will be resolved-- talled automatically. so, they are not the central issue. by removing that, i think he changed the relationship with the israelis in a positive way. >> in some wa, i think he is right about this. it is also true that benjamin netanyahu is facing a different situation at home. he does not have the same kind of majority, came closer to losing than people thought he would. obama was reelected despite his attempts to prevent that. so, they both have an interest in getting something done. i think it is highly remote that anything will get done. the neighborhood has only gotten more dangerous. >> colby king? >> i thought it waimportant that he made the trip. ultimately, if there is going to be peace in the area it will have to come from those on the ground.

the united states can not do it from the outside. george bush tried unsuccessfully. every president has tried and all failed because of the participants. >> what has changed? the settlements continue, but it is no long number one on presidt obama's agenda. >> the president has acknowledged the mistake early on, but let's be frank, the relationship has changed. netanyahu embraced, endorsed and basically campaigned for mitt romney, who did not carry florida, which was supposed to be the cornerstone of the campaign strategy. barack obama did get reelected and made a case that the two- state solution was imperative for israel's values, that we

do not have people that will be stopped at every checkpoint and cannot move freely in their homeland. making an appeal to jewish values and traditions. i thought it was great. >> it is pushing on an open door. the israelis have offered peace. they offered peace in 1967, at camp david in 2000 and in 2008. the point is not the settlemen s , and that is the reason it is important what obama said. he essentially said it is not the settlements, but that the palestinians have never accepted a jewish state, and until they

accept a jewish state d are willing to sign an agreement that ends the conflict, you will never have a settlement. that is why it is third the agenda. iran is one, syria is two, and peace is way down there at number three. >> i do not disagree with you. it is the presence of the jewish state that is causing all the others to resist an agreement, and to undercut it. recognizing the israeli's right to exist, that is not an issue. recognizing a jewish state is something they are opposed to. >> there also has to be lines that make sense for the palestinian state. i cannot argue this with charles with the same kind of detail and prevail, but i have looked at what the offers have been, and they are not realistic for either side still. they have not solved jerusalem. the israelis do not want to share jerusalem. nobody wants to share jerusalem. >> it is simply factually wron

in the agreement offered in 2008, jerusalem was split. in what israel offered in camp david in the year 2000 with clinton as the witness, the israelis offered a division of jerusalem for the first time ever. that is simply factually wrong. the israelis have offered this, and arafat would not sign. the question is would anybody sign an agreement that aepts a jewish state, and for six decades, the answer has been no. >> 2008, different administrations in both israel and the united states, and the case and the reality is you cannot have israel existing as a single state without facing demographic distraction. that will change the entire character of israel. it will repeal the jewish

values that have animated israel. that is to me, the real incentive. >> you cannot make peace if the other side wants to see nothing but your eradication. if that changes, there wl be a peace. republicans engage in some self-criticism and rand paul offers an immigration plan. >> there is no one reason we lost. our message was weak. our ground game was insufficient. we were not inclusive. >> the chairman of the republican committee. why did mitt romney lose in 2012? the republican national committee did some homework on the question. it was an autopsy that involves -- involved contacting more than 50,000 people. they did not need a study to ll them presidenobamowne the minority vote. charles, your reaction to the study? >> i would not have used the word "autopsy," as it applies to a corpse.

we still have the gop, althought it is somewhat in a coma, but it will recover after eight years of liberalism. the one thing the rnc had to look at is what it did wrong. it should not be leading the party abt ideas or ideology. that is the job of the leaders in the party and the candidates, but it should have done the nuts and bolts -- the outreach, the social media, the kind of ground game that obama had and republicans did not. it was lacking, and that is where it needs to recover, otherwise the game will be uneven from here until the end of time. >> colby king, i do not remember a case of self-examination to this extent in the past. >> you have never had the need for such self-examination.

>> 1972, george mcgovern. >> they did do something after that. there was reform inside the democratic party, but in this case, i think they were right to look at the mechanics, but also they have to look at the other problem they have, the perception of the republican party. those focus groups put their finger on the problem. this is perceived to be a party that does not care about people. you do not change that by putting out fieldworkers to talk to people. that is not going to change it. it is not just a message, but the policy. why are people not responding to the republican message? >> you can have outreach, but you have to have something to outreach with. you cannot get women to vote for you if you are campaigning against the availability of contraception. you cannot get hispanics to really look at you and asians to really look at you when you are

campaigning against immigration reform. you already see changes. an interesting column friday talked about how most of the conservative think tanks have priorities set by rather ideological donors. they are not addressing people's need for an alternative on healthcare. if you do not like obamacare, come up with a realistic alternative -- that kind of thing. >> ronald reagan carried pennsylvania, new jersey, california, massachusetts, ohio, florida, michigan -- all of the big states. he won 59% of the white vote. mr. romney won 59% of the white vote and he did not carry any of those states.

i commend the republicans for going through this exercise. it is painful. it opens them up to scrutiny, to cheap shots, but they are doing something that most parties loss -- most parties gloss over. most parties blame the defeat on their own candidate. john mccain was the grumpy old man candidate -- that is why he lost. al gore was a stiff. that is why the democrats lost. it is an easy explanation. they are confronting something very real. they deserve great credit. it is difficult and painful. most technological advances do not come out of the party apparatus. ey come out as howard dean had social networking, and barack obama took that to different levels in 2012. >> rand paul had a speech on immigration that even marco rubio praised.

>> rand paul is, to me, representing what republicans ought to be doing, and not what priebus is talking about. paul called the harvard university business school and asked for an opportunity to talk to the students about the future of the republican party and the african-american community on april 10. he is not waiting to get the nomination and then put together the outreach programs. he is doing it now. he is doing this on a number of fronts. this is what the republican party has to do. not just worry about the mechanicof the campan. >> i am all for idealizing, idolizing rand paul. this is a fella who has re- created himself. this is the new rand paul. when he ran for senate three

years ago, what did he run on? he ran on an electrical wire across the southern border, helicopters and the repeal of birthright citizenship. now is a born-again, he has opened it up. god bless him, and welcome to the cause, but let's not say it is a changing, evolving man. >> charles? >> where do you start? i have 18 items left and eight seconds. it is like the end of the movie when the guy is dying and is about to say who killed him, and you say, "say it already." >> say it already, charles. >> one thing about mitt romney, we h a gd mabut lousy candidate. in 2010, when we had no candidate, it was all about

ideas and ideology and the republicans were extremely successful. the idea that the message, the ideology, is wrong, i think it is a mistake and it has a lot to with who the candidate is. >> colby king? >> may i suggest that your analysis of 2010 is wrong? the reason the republicans did well is because they were running against obamacare, and barack obama was not on the ticket. when barack obama is on the ticket, you get a different result, as we saw last year. 2010 was not a referendum on barack obama. the referendum on barack obama was the presidential election and look at the turnout -- the people that came out for him. you continue to misread the results. >> i hate to agree with you because you are trying to disagree with me, so it gets really complicated here. [laughter] i agree with you that barack obama is one of the great candidates in american history

and that explains why the democrats did well in 2008 and 2012 -- we had a great candidate -- in 2010, when you neutralize the factor of the candidate, the republicans prevailed, which tells me that republican ideas are strong, and you have to have a candidate or a class of people that can explain it. >> that is the subject of the message to the american people, and they bought it. >>ut in 10, obacareas a factor and it will be a factor in 2014, do you not agree? >> it might very well be, but i will point out that we have returned to the days of yesteryear when dr. krauthammer

was laboring in the democratic vineyards, and the explanation was ronald reagan won because he was a superior candidate, he was engaging, likeable and charismatic, and democratic opponents were not. you have to accept that when voters vote for a candidate and a party, they know what they are doing. they are not just being bamboozled by some lapel pin or hairspray. that is frankly what they did when they elected ronald reagan in 1984, and with obama in 2012. they knew what they were doing. >> your interpretation gives one great hope for the future of democracy. >> when you look at what the republican party analysis of itself was, the fear was that the electorate is a different electorate, and it is not just much more of a minority electorate. it wants some serious social and economic safety net that is

different than what they hear from republicans. >> the face of conservatism is rush limbaugh. we all agree with that. there is another face on this table, but let's stay with that. he puts down the results by saying obama won with low information voters, that they were sort of stupid, they do not understand the issues and they fall for this stuff. that is the same argument we heard in a much more sophisticated way from somebody else. >> rush limbaugh, the face of the republican party -- that is a little -- >> that is a little harsh. if we are going to choose

someone in the media as the face of the republican paty, i would nominate charles. >> i would second the nomination. >> if nominated, i will not run. but if elected, i will serve. i am just lazy. i take a point of personal privilege for you mentioning my youth as a democrat. i agree. i was young once, but i am cured, unlike my colleagues over here. >> there is this interesting rift in the republican party right now. i was talking to steve schmidt o sa theres a rift between the evangelical base and libertarians, and rand paul, in some ways, is a schizophrenic candidate representing that. >> this week marks the 10th anniversary of the american invasion of iraq that following the 9/11 attacks. a cnn poll says 56% of americans believe it was a mistake. one quarter of them think it is

a victory. the bush administration told us we had to get there to get the weapons of mass destruction. president bush said the new regime in iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom. how did it play out, nina totenberg? >> it played out horribly. when you read the postmortems, a lot of people from iraq and here and policy wonks, many who were supportive of the effort, have come to regret it, and part of the reason is we have changed the balance in the middle east. we had a saddam hussein who was a check on iran. he is gone. there were no weapons of mass destruction and the country is in shambles. >> i have read comments from those who fought there that thought they were engaged in a noble effort, colby king. >> of course they did. they did nothing wrong. what was wrong was to commit the country to a war on a pretense that turned out to be false. weapons of mass destruction --

once they were not found the yetpose for the war was gone. we continue to go on. and do not cite the surge as some cause. it was supposed to stop violence. if you look in iraq today, where are we? nothing was achieved of any great value. >> charles? >> it was a ble effort -- in fact, the region was rid of a dictator that was one of the coolest on the planet and he ran - one of the cruelest on the planet and he ran a country that had been aggressive

with just about all of their neighbors. the neighborhood is rid of him. the mistake was trying to run an occupation where we wanted to completely change the country. we took apart the army, the currency and the coinage, as we did with nazi germany, and that was a fatal error. it was redeemed by the surge, which ended the civil war, and left us in a position where we could have maintained influence in the country, but the worse mistake was obama did not negotiate an agreement that would've allowed a residual american presence. we have no influence on the evolution of the country, which is a strategic linchpin. >> so little time, so many mistakes. first of all, in war, there are no unwounded veterans. one out of two americans has applied for disability benefits. 4488 dead. 31,965 wounded. 2 million iraqis displaced. 110,000 dead. a war of aggression.

a lone ranger war without a coalition, without the u.s. seeking the cooperation of the united nations. a disaster in every respect. economically, diplomatically and morally. >> do you think the iraq are worse off? >> iraqi women are worse off. make no mistake about it. >> we agree to disagree on this one. paul ryan's budget passes again. >> i do not think bain capital would ever invest in a business plan for america that would spend less than 5% of its revenue on a growth agenda. >> we still have no budget from the president in violation of the law. he gets his ncaa bracket in on time, but no budget. >> the nba bracket -- republicans like to beat him up

on that one. ryan budget passes the house. what happens to that budget next? >> it dies in the senate. it only got 40 votes in the senate. it was seen as the ineffectiveness of severe austerity, an economic plan in europe, and i do not think we need to started here. >> good news, the government will not shut down, not at least until the end of september. >> i think we need to give credit to senator barbara mikulski on this. she negotiated a great deal in the senate and also the house. she has come through as a top- notch legislator. that said, bigger problems are ahead of us. >> the 8% of defense will kick in, so there will be furloughs. >> they have delayed the furloughs because of the continuing resolution. >> that is a good point because 28% of all federal hires are we talk about how much we revere and respect and admire veterans. they are the ones that will get

laid off. >> the republicans are lucky that the ryan plan does not have a chance. if the american people got wind of the kind of cuts that would happen under this budget, and most people do not pay attention to this back-and-forth, but it started to happen, they would not like it at all. you can see that in all the data. >> i hate to be critical of you -- actually, i do not really. but you missed the story on the budget. the real news is the senate offered a budget for the first time since 2009. the ipad did not even exist the last time. [laughter] that is completely dead on arrival. it is the most appalling document you have ever seen. it does not look at any entitlements. it does not have any cuts. it marches us off a cliff into greece and perhaps cyprus. >> last word, appalling document. that will be it. thank you. see you next week.

>> for a transcript of this broadcast, log onto insidewashington.tv. >> for transcripts of this